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President Truman on freedom, peace, prosperity and international cooperation

“There is not going to be any short-cut to preserving our own freedom or securing the peace fo the world through international cooperation of free and peaceful nations…
…I am confident that the American people have never been more strongly united in their determination to preserve our own freedom and to aid friendly nations…
…Our actions in the days ahead must reflect that unity and I am confident that all of you will do your utmost to see to it that a united American people overcome the obstacles and dangers which lie between us and our common goal of a just and lasting peace.”
TRUMAN, Harry S. Typed Letter Signed. Washington, DC, November 20, 1950. A substantial letter with excellent content from President Truman addressed to Dwight R.G. Palmer, an executive of the Democratic National Committee. In this remarkable letter President Truman makes a forceful and earnest request for support in building a secure and lasting peace in the early post-war period. This letter reflects what historians regard as President Truman’s greatest achievement, i.e., his success in building a secure and stable peace after the Second World War.

Rare 1861 third edition of Darwin's Origin of Species, a scholar's copy

The important 1861 third edition of Darwin’s On the Origin of Species was the first to include Darwin’s account of the work of his predecessors.
“The great majority of naturalists believe that species are immutable productions, and have been separately created. This view has been ably maintained by many authors. Some few naturalists, on the other hand, believe that species undergo modification, and that the existing forms of life have descended by true generation from pre-existing forms.”
In the original publisher’s blindstamped green cloth gilt (with Edmonds & Remnants ticket); half-title, one folding plate, advertisement leaf at the end. Cloth a bit rubbed, some loss at lower spine, hinges holding despite some wear; generally a very presentable copy with an interesting provenance.
Provenance: Professor Martin Brasier (1947-2014), a celebrated palaeobiologist and author of Darwin’s Lost World: The Hidden History of Animal Life (published in 2009 as part of the Charles Darwin centenary celebrations). This copy with an inscription by Brasier: “used in Darwin’s study at Down House, Kent”. Also James Earl Moreton, F.R.C.S. (1831-1914), bookplate; Thomas W. Earl Moreton, gift inscription to G.B. Leach

Signed by Annie Leibovitz

FIRST EDITION, SIGNED BY ANNIE LEIBOVITZ.
“I hate the word ‘celebrity.’ I’ve always been more interested in what people do than who they are, and I hope that my photographs reflect that. I have the opportunity to work with people who are the best actors, and writers, and athletes, and dancers–a broad spectrum. I feel like I’m photographing people who matter, in one way or another. I’m photographing my time.”–Annie Leibovitz, in an interview with Literal Magazine
Folio, original photo-pictorial boards, original glassine. Minor tears at extremities of rear glassine wrapper. A lovely copy.

President Truman on freedom, peace, prosperity and international cooperation

“There is not going to be any short-cut to preserving our own freedom or securing the peace fo the world through international cooperation of free and peaceful nations…
…I am confident that the American people have never been more strongly united in their determination to preserve our own freedom and to aid friendly nations…
…Our actions in the days ahead must reflect that unity and I am confident that all of you will do your utmost to see to it that a united American people overcome the obstacles and dangers which lie between us and our common goal of a just and lasting peace.”
TRUMAN, Harry S. Typed Letter Signed. Washington, DC, November 20, 1950. A substantial letter with excellent content from President Truman addressed to Dwight R.G. Palmer, an executive of the Democratic National Committee. In this remarkable letter President Truman makes a forceful and earnest request for support in building a secure and lasting peace in the early post-war period. This letter reflects what historians regard as President Truman’s greatest achievement, i.e., his success in building a secure and stable peace after the Second World War.

First edition of Mario Puzo's masterpiece

First edition of Puzo’s masterpiece with all first issue points. Octavo. Original black quarter cloth, original dust jacket. Book fine, dust jacket uncommonly bright with only trivial wear to the extremities; small chip at the back top corner of the dust jacket. An exceptional copy.

"A girl who had everything...until she lost her life"

First edition superbly bound in modern morocco. She was young, stylish and beautiful. A girl who had everything…until she lost her life. Hercule Poirot recalled an earlier outburst by a fellow passenger: “I’d like to put my dear little pistol against her head and just press the trigger.” Yet in this exotic setting nothing was ever quite what it seemed. A fine copy.

First edition of Ayn Rand's magnum opus

First edition of Ayn Rand’s magnum opus and certainly one of the most influential books published in the 20th century. A superior copy with the original dust jacket, in the original green cloth. Near fine with text remarkably clean and text block solid (rarely the case with this stout octavo), small spot to front board; dust jacket bright and clean with few small creases and tiny chips; spine lightly toned, overall an excellent copy of a book seldom seen in such nice condition. All first issue points present.

“The world is a fine place and worth fighting for...”

First edition of perhaps Hemingway’s finest novel, in the first issue dust jacket. Octavo, original beige cloth, original dust jacket. Book about fine, dust jacket uncommonly bright with very minor shallow chipping to spine, few small creases to extremities. Overall an excellent copy.

Scarce Review Copy of Kerouac's On the Road in Fine Condition

FIRST EDITION, of the defining work of Beat literature. Scarce review copy, with stiff review card laid-in.
“Kerouac’s literary art bore no resemblance to the undisciplined ‘beatnik’ writing of the late 1950s. His extraordinary attention to detail, astonishing memory, and encyclopedic grasp of European and American literature, popular culture, and world religions enabled him to create densely textured narratives that, when read aloud as they were meant to be, achieved an incantatory dimension rarely experienced in modern literature” (American National Biography). On the Road was Kerouac’s first work—and in fact the first work in American literature—that exemplified this “literary art”.
While most critics dismissed the novel as “self-indulgent, irresponsible, or dangerous”, “it created an instant literary sensation” (ibid.). At the time of its publication, it was one of the few books that perfectly captured the zeitgeist of the post-war years and echoed it back to the rest of the country, amplified and embellished, to create something eternally contemporary. “Now more than ever, it seems, reading Paradise’s tale brings out the questing young wanderer in many a reader, no matter one’s age, gender, nationality, or predilection for all things Beat” (Holiday).
Octavo, original cloth, original dust jacket; custom half-morocco box. With advance review slip laid-in. Book fine, dust jacket in outstanding condition with a few flecks of rubbing; also a small patch of dampstaining visible on verso only. A superb copy with the extremely rare review card.

“When you read this book, from page one you feel a threat following you, some animistic urging that keeps you going by the way McCarthy manipulates your demonic love of the sounds of speech. It’s seductive, the way shots of tequila offer the promise of danger, the way Shakespeare convinces you that even though Macbeth is up on the stage and you’re in the audience you’re thinking and feeling along with him, his bravado, his self-convincing, his descent, his death…” –Harold Augenbraum
FIRST EDITION of the first novel of McCarthy’s Border Trilogy.
“Winner of the 1992 National Book Award and the 1992 National Book Critics Circle Award for fiction, Cormac McCarthy’s sixth novel, All The Pretty Horses, simultaneously recapitulates and transcends many of the themes, situations, structures, and characters of his earlier work…” (Arnold and Luce, Perspectives on Cormac McCarthy).
New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1992. Octavo, original cloth, original dust jacket. A fine copy.

FIRST EDITION, FIRST ISSUE. Original cloth, original dust jacket. First issue dust jacket with “1/66” code on the front flap; “Publishers of the American College Dictionary and the Modern Library” on rear flap. A superb copy.

DEDICATION COPY OF SNYDER’S FIRST BOOK, SIGNED AND INSCRIBED BY SNYDER: “For Jim Baxtor / from Gary”. Baxtor is one of 12 dedicatees.
Octavo, original wrappers, Japanese string tied binding. One of only 500 copies. Fine

FIRST EDITION in English, beautifully illustrated with 104 plates (64 in full color), and TWO ORIGINAL COLOR LITHOGRAPHS done expressly for this edition.
“All the time I was working, I felt my father and my mother were looking over my shoulder, and behind them were Jews, millions of other vanished Jews of yesterday and a thousand years ago.” –Chagall, on the creation of The Jerusalem Windows
Chagall’s Jerusalem Windows illustrates and chronicles the creation of the famous twelve stained glass windows, one for each of the twelve tribes of Israel, designed by Chagall for the Hadassah-Hebrew University Medical Center Synagogue in Jerusalem.
Text and Notes by Jean Leymarie. Original red cloth, original pictorial dust jacket. Without the rarely seen publisher’s slipcase. Book fine, dust jacket near-fine with only a little edgewear.

FIRST EDITION, FIRST PRINTING of what is considered to be Dick’s finest work and winner of the 1963 Hugo Award. A beautiful copy in the original dust jacket.First printing with D36 of page 239. Pringle, Science Fiction: The 100 Best Novels, 37.
Octavo, original black cloth, original dust jacket. Book with slight bump at heel of spine and a hint of edgewear to dust jacket. A beautiful, bright copy.

Signed by Arthur Rackham

RACKHAM, ARTHUR; SWINBURNE, ALGERNON CHARLES.
The Springtide of Life. Poems of Childhood by Algernon Charles Swinburne.
SIGNED LIMITED FIRST EDITION, number 354 of only 765 copies signed by illustrator Arthur Rackham. Beautifully illustrated collection of Swinburne’s children’s poems, with nine mounted colored plates and 52 black and white drawings.
One reason why Swinburne never brought out such a collection was his failure to find an artist who could interpret to his satisfaction the simplicity and freshness of his verses. We are fortunate in having secured, in Mr. Arthur Rackham, one whose delicate and romantic fancy is in sensitive harmony with Swinburne’s, and who understands, no less than he did, ho ‘Heaven lies about us in our infancy.'” –Edmund Gosse, Preface
Quarto, original half vellum over parchment boards with gilt designs. Some soiling to endpapers, binding with only the slightest soiling; an exceptionally clean copy.

LIMITED EDITION, one of 750 copies.
“All I can say is that most modern books weary me, but Burton never does…His writing is like talk, learned but earthy, and once he starts, he is hard to stop…That he was a humorist in our sense of the word we need no biographical facts to attest: The Anatomy of Melancholy is, by a magnificent and somehow very English irony, one of the great comic works of the world.”— Anthony Burgess
Two volumes. Quarto. Original vellum-backed decorative boards. Printed on Dutch paper. An excellent set, clean throughout.

ARTHUR MIZENER'S REVIEW COPY, WITH ANNOTATIONS BY MIZENER.

ARTHUR MIZENER’S REVIEW COPY OF PHILIP ROTH’S MASTERFUL FIRST BOOK. WITH ANNOTATIONS BY MIZENER.
“The real novelty of Roth’s view of American Jewish Life, circa 1959, was its absence of any sense of tragedy or oppression… Hurling themselves into the American Dream, the Patimkins live a continuous daily round of sports… and of eating–gargantuan meals, served by Carlota, the maid, that smother conversation in active digestion and extra helpings.” –Claudia Roth Pierpoint, Roth Unbound: A Writer and His Books
“Professor Mizener’s best-selling biography of Fitzgerald, ”The Far Side of Paradise,” was published in 1951 by Houghton Mifflin, a decade after a heart attack ended the downward-spiraling career of the canonizer of the Jazz Age of the 1920’s.”–NY Times obituary, Feb. 15, 1988.
Octavo. Original cloth, original dust jacket. Review slip laid in. Bookplate of Arthur Mizener. Neat pencil annotations by Mizener throughout. Spine toned with small chip at head and light edgewear. Custom leather box. An impressive copy. RARE.

FIRST EDTION, THE EXTREMELY RARE HARDCOVER ISSUE; one of an estimated fifty copies bound for presentation.
“[T]his is an almost perfect monograph. It begins and ends with Sommer’s exquisite abstractions, and includes some of the best examples of Sommer’s work in portraiture, collage, landscape, and still life to date. Every two-page spread reveals something more about the images through their juxtaposition. And then there is the text. It is very unusual to have writing at this level, uninfected with either sentimentality or pomposity, from an American photographer, but what’s more unusual is to have an artist who makes images and text and can combine them in a way that deepens and extends the effects of each. This early enactment of Sommer’s ideas about the workings of linguistic and pictorial logic is a gem” (David Levi Strauss. The Book of 101 Books). Roth 101.
Complete with 30 black and white photographs. New York: Aperture, 1962. Small folio (235x205mm), original white cloth with black lettering. Only a few spots of soiling to cloth. A magnificent copy.

FIRST EDITION of Isaac Newton’s posthumously published theological interpretation of the Biblical prophecies.
“It has generally been assumed that the work was a product of his old age, as the treatise published was. Nevertheless, references to the prophecies filled his early theological notebook. Already in the 1670s, he believed that the essence of the Bible was the prophecy of human history rather than the revelation of truths beyond human reason unto life eternal. Already at that time he believed what he asserted later about Revelation: ‘There [is] no book in all the scriptures so much recommended & guarded by providence as this.’ He put that belief into practice by composing his earliest theological study. It proved to be more than a passing interest. His first full discourse contains many insertions in later hands, showing that he referred to it frequently. He composed numerous revisions of it, one of which was probably the last thing on which he was at work when he died more than fifty years later.” (Richard Westfall, The Life of Sir Isaac Newton).
Quarto, period style boards. Uncut, a superb copy.

Pre-publication edition, SIGNED by Soth. Number 26 or 30 numbered copies. With original Inkjet prints bound into cloth covers. Gilt stamped brown cloth with an original photograph mounted on front cover. Fine copy.

“Love is all the dirty little tricks you taught me that you probably got out of some book.”
FIRST EDITION. Original cloth, original dust jacket. A very good copy; jacket bright and well preserved with light rubbing, edgewear and a patch of discoloration on verso only. A very handsome copy.

Signed and inscribed by August Sander

FIRST EDITION of Sander’s classic, one of the most influential photobooks of the early twentieth-century. SIGNED AND INSCRIBED BY SANDER.
August Sander “was part of a coterie of photographers who established the photographic book as an aesthetically and commercially viable art form in the 1920s. Though Sander had published one such book in 1924, Unsere Heimat, Hannover, it was the 1929 publication of Antlitz der Zeit (The Face of Our Time) that propelled him into enduring fame” (Warren, Encyclopedia of Twentieth-Century Photography).
“Many of his classic images are included in this seminal photobook, and the essential qualities of Sander’s vision can be seen. He took typical examples of professions, trades and social classes in Weimar Germany, and photographed them in their familiar environments in order to build up, piece by piece, a dispassionate image of the ‘face’ of society… One of his work’s miracles is how, despite his nominal objectivity, his political view shines through… His work is not neutral. It is not just penetrating, but was seen as positively dangerous, a little too acute in its analysis of society and class, by those with certain vested interests. This is made clear by the fact that when the Nazis came to power in Germany in 1933, publisher’s copies of Antlitz der Zeit were seized, the plates destroyed, and the negatives confiscated by Hitler’s Ministry of Culture” (The Photobook, I.124). Roth 52.
Quarto. Original yellow cloth, original dust jacket. Signed and inscribed by Sander. Scarce original dust jacket with small chips at spine ends and extremities, and significant tears with loss at bottom portion of spine and front cover and at top of dust jacket rear (1″x4″).

“The Design which forms the Frontispiece to this book, and which is therefore presumed to be somewhat typical of the intention of Fable, represents Man tried at the Court of the Lion for the ill-treatment of a Horse. It will be seen that Man has the worst of it…”
Quarto. Hand-colored wood-engraved frontispiece, title and 22 plates by Swain after Charles Bennett. Finely bound in near-contemporary maroon calf. Light wear to spine and extremities; internally clean and nearly fine. A handsome and very appealing copy.

Number 623 of 1200 copies on vein, SIGNED AND INSCRIBED by Paul Eluard

“Although Man Ray participated in and produced hundreds of fruitful collaborative works in his life, Facile must be ranked among the most successful.” –Roth, 101 Books
Number 623 of 1200 copies on vein, SIGNED AND INSCRIBED by Paul Eluard on the half-title.
Quarto, original wappers; custom half-morocco box. First gathering loose, a hint of wear to wrapper edges. A fine copy.

Signed by W.B. Yeats, 1/1000 copies

SIGNED LIMITED FIRST EDITION of Yeats’s autobiographical work; one of only 1000 copies signed by Yeats.
“Looking back from 1922, [Yeats] titled his autobiographical account of the decade of the 1890s The Trembling of the Veil. He recalled that Mallarme has said that ‘his epoch was troubled by the trembling of the veil of the Temple,’ and that ‘as those words were still true, during the years of my life described in this book,’ he had named it accordingly” (The Cambridge Companion to W.B. Yeats).
Octavo, original half parchment over light green boards; original dust jacket. Dust jacket spine with light wear at the spine (slightly affecting label) and minor toning. A FINE COPY in the scarce original dust jacket.

SIGNED BY ULYSSES S. GRANT AS PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.
Partly-printed vellum document signed, “U.S. Grant,” as president. Military commission appointing H. Schuyler Ross a First Assistant Engineer in the Navy. Countersigned by George M. Robeson as Secretary of the Navy. Washington, 1873. Approximately 19 1/2×16 inches; slightly faded signature, usual folds, minor soiling, seal intact.

One of the foundational texts in science fiction, signed by Hugo Gernsback

SCARCE FIRST EDITION, SIGNED BY GERNSBACK, of one of the foundational texts in science fiction.
“In April 1911 ‘Modern Electrics’ began serializing Gernsback’s Ralph 124C 41+, written to exemplify (Gernsback’s) contention that fiction could serve to teach science… Thoroughly deficient as fiction, the story nevertheless predicts radar, microfilm and microfiche, tape recorders, television, wireless transmission of power, planet hormones, and weather control” (American National Biography).
Ralph 124C 41+ was published when many other magazines were struggling, and it led Gernsback to almost single-handedly establish a place for science fiction stories, as he allowed contemporary writers space in his science magazines. The success of these stories may have induced Gernsback to create the first science fiction magazine, Amazing Stories, which started publication the year after Ralph 124C 41+ was printed in book form. The Hugo Awards, science fiction’s most prestigious prize, were named in honor of Hugo Gernsback.
Signed on the front free endpaper.
Octavo, original blue cloth with gilt lettering, original dust jacket. Bookplate of Roy V. Hunt, editor and artist for the science fiction magazine The Alchemist on front pastedown. Book fine with cloth exceptionally bright; original dust jacket with some tape reinforcement at verso edges; closed tear at top of front panel and very minor edgewear. Rare signed.

A fine copy in the original dust jacket

FIRST EDITION of Lawrence’s account of his journey on foot through northern Syria. Illustrated with 129 photographs taken by the author.
Octavo. Original cloth, original brown paper dust jacket. First issue with page 16 mis-numbered. Fine in a superb dust jacket with only very minor occasional rubbing.

PMM 417

FIRST EDITION IN ORIGINAL WRAPPERS of de Broglie’s presentation of his revolutionary theory of the wave-particle duality of matter. PMM 417.
De Broglie’s work “served as the basis for developing the general theory nowadays known by the name of wave mechanics, a theory which has utterly transformed our knowledge of physical phenomena on the atomic scale.”
Octavo, original printed wrappers; custom cloth box. Modest bookplate on inside front wrapper; tape repair to initial blank. Minor discoloration to wrapper edges; an excellent copy.

Miller's fourth novel, in the original wrappers

FIRST EDITION, FIRST PRINTING of Miller’s fourth novel in the original wrappers. With the scarce errata slip tipped-in; 60 Francs on the spine and front flap. Moderate expert restoration at spine head and joints. Overall a very handsome copy.

LIMITED EDITION, WITH TWO SIGNED COLOR ETCHINGS BY MAX ERNST, and 25 additional color lithographs; one of only 250 copies (out of a total edition of 320). An evocative collaboration between the surrealist poet Prevert and the surrealist artist Ernst. The Livre d’Artiste in the Twentieth Century 46.
Large folio, loose as issued in original lithographed paper wrappers; original buckram clamshell box. Fraying to box edges, some foxing to wrappers; interior and plates fine.

FIRST EDITION, second state (as usual), without the rare gilt golden gun on the front board.
James Bond drank down the rest of his beer and got slowly to his feet. He walked towards Scaramanga and was about to pass him when the man reached out a languid left arm and caught him at the biceps. He held the snout of his gun to his nose, sniffing delicately. The expression in the dead brown eyes was far-away. He said, ‘Mister, there’s something quite extra about the smell of death. Care to try it?’ He held out the glittering gun as if he was offering James Bond a rose…
Octavo, original black cloth, original dust jacket. An excellent copy.